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Yesterday SocialistWorker.org retracted an interview with Gilad Atzmon they had published just the day before, after a stream of socialists sent angry letters denouncing Atzmon's antisemitism.

An editorial statement from SocialistWorker.org gives the explanation:

ON JULY 13, SocialistWorker.org published an interview with jazz musician and anti-Zionist writer Gilad Atzmon. The interview took up Atzmon's childhood in Israel and his growing awareness of the oppression of Palestinians, as well as his ideas on music and art.

Since the interview's publication, we have learned of many allegations that Atzmon has made not just highly inflammatory, but anti-Semitic statements about Jews, be they supporters or opponents of the state of Israel--and that he has associations with deniers of the Nazi Holocaust of the Jews. The evidence for these serious charges is damning.

We knew that Atzmon was a controversial figure among opponents of Israel when we ran our article, but not the full extent of these allegations. And needless to say, there is no trace of such ideas in his interview with SocialistWorker.org, or it never would have been published.

Nevertheless, we believe that our Web site, which is committed to the liberation of the Palestinian people and to the struggle against anti-Semitism, should not have published the interview without any reference to the controversy over someone who could make the comments and advance the ideas that he has--whatever his motives or reasoning. We have therefore withdrawn the article from our site. We invite our readers to comment by e-mail to views@socialistworker.org.